Music news, concert schedules, upcoming CDs and DVDs, feature articles, personalities, facts, figures, trivia and tidbits from around the world...

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Jethro Tull's 'Stand Up' To Get Elevated

Jethro Tull's second album, Stand Up, marked an early turning point for the band with the addition of guitarist Martin Barre along with Ian Anderson's introduction of folk-rock influences to the group's blues-based sound. Released in the summer of 1969, Stand Up rose quickly to the top of the U.K. Albums Chart, and eventually earned gold certification in the U.S.

This fall, Parlophone will release Stand Up (The Elevated Edition), a deluxe version of the album as a double CD with a DVD set on November 18.

The set will include:

The original album and bonus tracks (including the previously unreleased "Bouree") remixed in 5.1 surround and stereo by Steven Wilson

A 96/24 flat transfer of the original stereo master tapes

A 96/24 flat transfer of the original mono and stereo mixes of "Living In The Past" and "Driving Song"

A vdeo of the band performing live in January 1969

The now familiar book sized packaging that includes a 112-page booklet with an extensive history of the album, track-by-track annotations by Ian Anderson, plus rare and unseen photographs

The original album's pop-up book artwork designed by James Grashow

Stand Up was the first album where Anderson controlled the music and lyrics, resulting in a group of diverse songs that ranged from the swirling blues of "A New Day Yesterday" and the mandolin-fueled rave-up of "Fat Man," to the group's spirited re-working of Johann Sebastian Bach's "Bouree in E Minor."

In a recent interview, Anderson picked Stand Up as his favorite Jethro Tull album, "because that was my first album of first really original music. It has a special place in my heart."

The first disc features Steven Wilson's new stereo mixes of the original album, along with a number of rare recordings, including an unreleased version of "Bouree." Other highlights include four songs recorded at the BBC, plus stereo single mixes for "Living In The Past" and "Driving Song."

The second disc captures Jethro Tull performing live in Sweden, where the band opened for Jimi Hendrix in January 1969. Recorded only a few weeks after Barre joined the band, the concert includes songs from Tull's debut album ("A Song For Jeffery" and "My Sunday Feeling"), as well as two songs destined for Stand Up: "Back To The Family" and "Nothing Is Easy." Rounding out the disc are mono single mixes for "Living In The Past" and "Driving Song," plus two radio spots promoting the album.

The DVD includes concert footage of the band performing "To Be Sad Is A Mad Way To Be" and "Back To The Family." The disc also features Steven Wilson's remix of the original album in PCM stereo and DD/DTS 5.1 surround sound; a 96/24 flat transfer of the original stereo master tapes; plus a 96/24 flat transfer of the original mono and stereo mixes of "Living In The Past" and "Driving Song."